Arashk Gheysar-Beygi, a 15-year-old student from Sarableh in Ilam province, has been subjected to physical and psychological torture by Ministry of Intelligence interrogators in order to extract forced “confessions”.
The incident occurred after the child was summoned to the city court and subsequently arrested on 29 June.
The city prosecutor informed the family that the detained child would only be released if his older brother, Arshia Gheysar-Beygi, turned himself in to the Ministry of Intelligence.
According to a source who spoke to the Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN), Arashk was taken into custody by the prosecutor’s order and transferred to the Juvenile Detention Centre of Ilam.
The source continued: “The detained child is taken daily to the Ministry of Intelligence detention centre in the city and returned to the juvenile detention centre at night. Security forces also attempted to arrest the family’s 17-year-old son, Arshia Gheysar-Beygi, but were unsuccessful as he was not at home during a raid on 30 June.”
Arashk Gheysar-Beygi had previously been summoned by the Sarableh police intelligence service on multiple occasions last year.
In addition, Arshia Gheysar-Beygi was arrested by security forces in October 2022 during the “Woman, Life, Freedom” uprising in Sarableh and released after ten days in prison.
The source added that Arashk Gheysar-Beygi was able to make a brief phone call to his family, in which he “revealed the severe torture inflicted on him by security interrogators to coerce false confessions”.
Last month, the Ministry of Intelligence in Ilam launched a new round of arrests in the city on the pretext that people were holding anti-government protests in the city as part of the “Woman, Life, Freedom” uprising.
Six civilians, including Mehrad Gheysar-Beygi, the uncle of the detained child, were arrested during this period.
As of now, Navid Mohammadnezhad, Mehrdad Gheisar-Beygi, Ayoub Garavand and Younes Garavand remain in temporary detention in Ilam Central Prison, while Mohammad Tahmasebi and Hamed Rahmani were released a few days ago on bail of 40 billion Iranian rials, which is nearly 80,000 USD.
